Yahoo Lifestyle How David Lynch, the Cast of ‘Twin Peaks’ and Her Lifelong Friends Are Paying Tribute to the Beloved Log Lady in a Documentary About Her Life
The Log Lady was a beloved part of “Twin Peaks.” But Catherine Coulson was much more than that. She was a fan favorite who made time to speak with series enthusiasts and helped perpetuate its lore, as well as a longtime actor with Ashland’s Oregon Shakespeare Festival and a camera assistant who pulled focus for David Lynch, John Cassavetes and Albert Brooks.
Coulson made “everyone who was close to her feel like they were her best friend,” says Richard Green, director of “I Know Catherine, The Log Lady,” a feature-length documentary that screens at Ojai’s Playhouse Theatre Saturday with a Q&A from “Twin Peaks” co-creator Mark Frost.
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Several of those friends were involved in making the doc, which ends with the dramatic story of the last few days of Coulson’s life, as Lynch and company raced against her rapidly progressing lung cancer to include her in the Showtime reboot “Twin Peaks: The Return.”
Coulson died in 2015, just four days after a brief Log Lady cameo was shot at her home in Oregon with a help from a local production company and Lynch directing on Skype from afar. It’s an emotional conclusion for the doc, as friends and family gather at her house to say goodbye while Lynch’s L.A. producer tries to ascertain whether Coulson might be healthy enough to fly to the Washington set on a Medevac plane.
But first, there’s an engrossing look at the life of a multi-faceted woman who grew up in the squeaky-clean 1950s, with a dad who worked in PR for Disney. As the counterculture began to flourish, Coulson became a hippie theater performer in the wild days of 1960s San Francisco. After moving to Hollywood, she ended up sharing an apartment with Lynch and “Eraserhead” star Jack Nance, whom she married. She played a pivotal role in “Eraserhead,” serving as assistant cameraperson and Lynch’s assistant, and that was when she and Lynch first began kicking around the Log Lady concept.
Although it was far from her only accomplishment, her role as Margaret, the mysterious Log Lady — who was given to intoning deadpan gems like “The answers to all our questions are in the wind and the trees, the rocks and the water” — made her into an iconic figure for legions of Lynch fans.
Green, who played The Magician in Lynch’s “Mulholland Drive,” interviewed more than 65 people for the doc over the past seven years. He ended up shooting some interviews in the same Beachwood Canyon apartment where he first met Coulson and Lynch.
More than two decades after “Mulholland Drive,” Green was thrilled to work again with Lynch, who generously shared his memories of his longtime friend and collaborator Coulson. “He’s the best audience in the world — ask any actor. He’s so present and so encouraging,” Green says, “That’s what I gave him on this film — I listened.”
“The interview with David was just an hour and a half of joy,” Green recalls of the shoot that was likely Lynch’s last screen appearance. “He’s one of the greatest storytellers that ever lived.”
Other “Twin Peaks” figures who contribute their memories of Coulson in the doc include Frost, Kyle MacLachlan, Dana Ashbrook, Grace Zabriskie, Michael Horse and Kimmy Robertson.
Green was interested in making a doc about Coulson from the moment he heard about the circumstances surrounding her final “Twin Peaks: The Return” appearance, recounted to him by Coulson’s longtime friend, executive producer Donna DuBain. “I thought, what an amazing story — somebody lives long enough to do this role one last time and dies four days later. It just seemed extraordinary to me,” Green says.
“Nobody really knew the whole story. That what the NDA was for,” he says. “Donna told me about this $6 million NDA that all of them had signed when they got there. The penalty would be $6 million if they told anybody about what happened.”
When it came time to film the doc’s climactic final scene, including footage from the shoot of “Twin Peaks: The Return,” Green says his main goal was to “get out of the way” and let the intimate conversations unfurl with no musical background.
Like Lynch, Coulson was an enthusiastic practitioner of transcendental meditation, which Green was also persuaded to try. “I actually thought it sounded pretty culty,” Green remembers. But during a stressful period in his life, he says, “I thought, ‘If I do TM training I’ll understand Catherine and David a little better and maybe it’ll help me.'”
Green says it was Coulson who was first promoted the spirit of camaraderie among Lynch’s casts and crews that persisted throughout his career. “David developed a sense of community and spirit and cooperation and positive energy on a set — I think that’s largely influenced by Catherine.”
The director also reveals that the Log Lady’s original log has been recovered and is on its way to a museum, while Coulson’s iconic red glasses will be on display at some of the screenings.
After Ojai, the doc will travel to Ashland, Portland, Los Angeles and other cities, and will also be available to stream on the film’s website starting May 21.
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